I had an opportunity to watch a family of Dollarbirds for three mornings. They comprised 1 adult and two juveniles. The juveniles were largely ‘kept’ 10-11 meters up in a Tabebuia pentaphylla (Tabebuia rosea) tree while the parent brought prey. It was surprising that there was no second adult in attendance. I saw numerous feeding episodes and prey was obtained every 2-5 minutes. All prey was caught by aerial sallies. I heard and recorded a number of calls and observed their relationship to family interactions. A call I heard only once was an Alarm-Call. This was given once when workmen arrived at the site, an audio recording is present here. This was a two note, scratchy call lasting 0.7 seconds and of a much higher frequency. The juveniles reacted to the call by flying off immediately, followed by the parent.

I had an opportunity to watch a family of Dollarbirds for three mornings. They comprised 1 adult and two juveniles. The juveniles were largely ‘kept’ 10-11 meters up in a Tabebuia pentaphylla (Tabebuia rosea) tree while the parent brought prey. It was surprising that there was no second adult in attendance. I saw numerous feeding episodes and prey was obtained every 2-5 minutes. All prey was caught by aerial sallies. I heard and recorded a number of calls and observed their relationship to family interactions. As the family was separated by workmen appearing I also had the opportunity to hear a Parent-Calling-Juveniles-Call, an audio recording is present here. The parent had obtained a prey and was on a perch looking for the two juveniles to feed them. It gave this call intermittently with no apparent order or rhythm. These discrete 8-9 kHz frequency calls last 0.1-0.15 seconds and are homogeneous on sonogram. This went on for about 1 minute and then the bird flew off to look for the juveniles. (In the recording you can hear Beeaters and Bulbuls in the background).

I had an opportunity to watch a family of Dollarbirds for three mornings. They comprised 1 adult and two juveniles. The juveniles were largely ‘kept’ 10-11 meters up in a Tabebuia pentaphylla (Tabebuia rosea) tree while the parent brought prey. It was surprising that there was no second adult in attendance. I saw numerous feeding episodes and prey was obtained every 2-5 minutes. All prey was caught by aerial sallies. I heard and recorded a number of calls and observed their relationship to family interactions. One call that has not been mentioned in most sources is the Juvenile Food-Begging-Call, an audio recording is present here. This is a fast call, given at 10 calls per second and lasts from a few seconds (4-5 seconds) to up to 15 seconds. The individual call lasts 0.1 seconds and the space between calls is also 0.1 seconds. The sonogram shows that this is a discrete, repetitive, sharp, multi-tiered call of 10-11 kHz frequency. The recording initially has one juvenile calling followed by the second joining in, intermittently. (In the recording you can hear an Asian Koel and Coppersmith Barbet faintly in the background).